Infectious diseases

Chronic hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection is a major cause of liver-related morbidity and mortality worldwide and is endemic in many areas of Asia and Africa. Adequate treatment of hepatitis B with effective antiviral agents can improve disease burden. Entecavir is a potent, selective nucleoside analogue with activity against HBV....

Meropenem is an effective broad-spectrum carbapenem antibiotic frequently prescribed for treatment of severe bacterial infections. We conducted a structured review of the published literature to review the microbiology, clinical efficacy and pharmacokinetics, pharmacodynamics and tolerability of meropenem for the treatment of serious bacterial infections. Robust susceptibility data describes the broad...

Because of the dramatic increase in severe infections caused methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), including skin and skin structure infections (SSSI), and reports of vancomycin failures in the treatment of these infections, agents with better activity against MRSA are clearly needed. Daptomycin, the first cyclic lipopeptide, exerts its concentration dependent bactericidal...

Darunavir is a next-generation protease inhibitor that demonstrates potent in vitro activity against wild type strains of HIV type-1, as well as against numerous strains resistant to available protease inhibitors. Numerous trials conducted in naïve and in the treatment-experienced HIV-infected individuals have significantly demonstrated greater virological suppression when darunavir was...

Background: Cutaneous leishmaniasis (CL) is one of the health problems of many tropical and subtropical regions and is endemic in many parts of Iran especially. Cutaneous leishmaniasis not only is a health problem but also is a social and cultural problem in Iran. Education about health for high risk...

Linezolid (trade names Zyvox™ , Zyvoxid™ and Zyvoxam™) is a synthetic antimicrobial agent of the family of oxazolidinones, which has been approved for the treatment of vancomycin-resistant Enterococcus faecium infections, lower respiratory tract infections, skin and skin-structure infections and diabetic foot infections caused by susceptible bacteria. Its antimicrobial spectrum, which...

Background: Chronic hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection is not a simple viral infection; it has many metabolic and autoimmune complications. Objective: To investigate the impacts of chronic HCV infection on glucose and lipid metabolism and its correlation-if any-with body mass index (BMI) and hepatosteatosis in chronic HCV patients. Patients and Methods: One...

Introductory Editorial by Dr Karna Dev Bardhan

A selective review of recent concepts, events and major recent research methodologies, and educational approaches in the field of vector-borne disease are drawn together in this article. Since vector borne disease is a major contributor to world disease bur- dens, and also comprises list of neglected diseases, recent research in...

Dalbavancin is an intravenous semisynthetic lipoglycopeptide which has demonstrated potent in vitro activity again most clinically significant Gram-positive pathogens such as methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, vancomycin-intermediate Staphylococcus aureus, and some vancomycin-resistant Enterococci. The long half-life of dalbavancin allows for once weekly dosing. In published clinical trials, a dose on day 1...

Serious bacterial infections with their high bioburden are often difficult to treat. Emergence of drug-resistant bacteria has worsened the situation, and management of these cases has become a therapeutic challenge. Prompt institution of appropriate antibiotic is vital in order to decrease complications and fatalities. Cefepime is a new fourth generation...

The vagina is a dynamic and finely tuned ecosystem in which homeostasis depends on mutually beneficial interactions between a human female and her resident microorganisms, an ecosystem that can be thrown off balance by a wide variety of both intrinsic and extrinsic factors. Although a functional equilibrium provides stability to...

Cefazolin sodium is a first-generation cephalosporin antibiotic and has been used worldwide since the early 1970s. It is used for the treatment of bacterial infections in various organs, such as the respiratory tract, skin and skin structure, genital tract, urinary tract, biliary tract, and bone and joint infections. It has...

In spite of the “epidemiological transition”, infectious diseases remain as major threats to the health and well-being of human populations. Social factors are related to the emergence and spread of infectious diseases. However, except for diseases which are more obviously social in their origin and patterns of spread (e.g. sexually-transmitted...

Imiquimod (trade name Aldara™) is a small molecule of the imidazoquinoline family, a group of nucleoside analogs that were first synthesized as potential antiviral agents. It has since been discovered to activate both innate and adaptive immunity, as well as apoptosis. Clinically, it has been approved for three indications thus...

Micafungin is an echinocandin that inhibits the synthesis of 1,3-b-D glucan, an essential cell wall component of Candida species. Micafungin, at a dosage of 100 mg daily, has been shown to be as efficacious as liposomal amphotericin B and caspofungin for the treatment of candidemia and invasive candidiasis. It is...

Invasive fungal infections (IFIs) cause significant morbidity, mortality, and increased cost of care in patients with hematological malignancies, prolonged (i.e. >7–10 days) treatment induced neutropenia, and other disease states causing underlying immunosuppression. One strategy often used to combat the development of invasive infections is the use of antifungal agents as...

Doxycycline has remained one of the most commonly used and inexpensive of the broad-spectrum antibiotic drugs currently in use. It has a variety of applications to common respiratory and genitourinary tract infections, but also amongst atypical infections, such as malaria, rickettsial infections, leptospirosis, brucellosis and some of the bioterrorist agents,...

Gary J. NoelJohnson & Johnson Pharmaceutical Research and Development, LLC, Raritan, NJ, USA.AbstractCompleting its initial phases of drug development in the mid 1990s as the one of the first fluoroquinolones that could be used with confidence to treat respiratory tract infections, levofloxacin went on to become one of the most...

Natasha E. Holmes and Patrick G.P. CharlesDepartment of Infectious Diseases, Austin Health, PO Box 5555, Heidelberg VIC 3084, Australia.  AbstractDoxycycline is a member of the tetracycline class of antibiotics and has been used clinically for more than 40 years. It is a well-tolerated drug that is bacteriostatic and acts via...

Background: Brucellosis is a zoonotic disease, with low incidence rate in developed countries, however the incidence rate in Middle Eastern countries remains high. Chest symptoms in brucellosis cases account for about 15% of the cases, but dealing with respiratory system involvement is rare particularly pleural involvement. Case Report: We report a...

Objectives: To report a case in where a mural endocarditis caused by Candida parapsilosis was successfully treated with the combination of 2 antifungal agents, caspofungin and voriconazole, in an extremely premature infant. Description: A female infant born at 30.7 weeks with weight 925 g. The infant had a pneumothorax and respiratory...

Amal K Halder1,2 and M Kabir1 1Jahangirnagar University, Dhaka-1342, Bangladesh. 2ICDDR,B, GPO Box 128, Dhaka-1000, Bangladesh. Abstract Background: Although, health status of Bangladeshis has improved, levels of child mortality in Bangladesh remain unacceptably high. This paper reviews household wealth inequalities in immunization coverage in Bangladesh. The objective...

Derek Gatherer MRC Virology Unit, Institute of Virology, University of Glasgow, Church Street, Glasgow, G11 5JR, UK Abstract Within the 230138 bp of the rat cytomegalovirus (RCMV) genome, the G+C content changes abruptly at position 142644, constituting a G+C content frontier. To the left of this...

H. Seale1, D.E. Dwyer2, J.R. Chapman3 and C.R. MacIntyre1,4 1School of Public Health and Community Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of New South Wales, Australia. 2Centre for Infectious Diseases and Microbiology Laboratory Services, Institute of Clinical Pathology and Medical Research (ICPMR), Westmead Hospital, NSW, Australia. 3Centre for Transplant and...

James P. Keblesh, Benjamin C. Reiner, Jianuo Liu and Huangui Xiong Neurophysiology laboratory, the Center for Neurovirology and Neurodegenerative Disorders, and Department of Pharmacology and Experimental Neuroscience, University of Nebraska Medical Center, Omaha, NE 68198-5880, U.S.A. Abstract HIV-1-associated dementia (HAD) describes the cognitive impairments and behavioral...

Khalid A. Al-Anazi1, Asma M. Al-Jasser3, Amal Abdulwahab1, Entezam Sahovic1, Hadeel Almana2 and Mohammed A. Al Fadda2 1Section of Adult Hematology and Hematopoietic Stem Cell Transplant, King Faisal Cancer Centre, King Faisal Specialist Hospital and Research Centre, P.O. Box: 3354, Riyadh 11211, Saudi Arabia. 2Departments of Medicine and Pathology,...

Tasha Biesinger and Jason T. Kimata Department of Molecular Virology and Microbiology, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, TX 77030. U.S.A. Abstract Upon transmission, human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) establishes infection of the lymphatic reservoir, leading to profound depletion of the memory CD4+T cell population despite the...

M Wolkewitz1, M Dettenkofer2, H Bertz3, M Schumacher1 and J Huebner4 1Institute of Medical Biometry and Medical Informatics, University Medical Center Freiburg, Germany. 2Institute of Environmental Medicine and Hospital Epidemiology, University Medical Center Freiburg, Germany. 3Department of Internal Medicine I (Haematology/Oncology), University Medical Center Freiburg, Germany. 4Division of Infectious...

Hung-Chin Tsai1,2, Yao-Shen Chen1, Susan Shin-Jung Lee1, Yu-Hung Lin1, Shue-Ren Wann1, Cheng Len Sy1 and Yung-Ching Liu1 1Section of Infectious Diseases, Department of Medicine, Kaohsiung Veterans General Hospital, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, National Yang-Ming University, Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China. 2Graduate Institute of Medicine, Kaohsiung Medical University, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, Republic of...